The Simpsons Season 24 Review “Gone Abie Gone”

I’ve been mostly down on The Simpsons so far this season, but finally the show has given me a reason to enjoy watching it, in the shape of "Gone Abie Gone." It’s an episode that’s a little bit smaller; there are no trips to New York City or giant implausible sinkholes, and both halves of the plot center around the Simpson family itself. And, importantly, most of the jokes are funny.

The first act involves Homer getting burnt by onion rings at a fast food drive-through, and, in a nice twist on the way this show tends to operate in its latter days, the first act directly leads to a further plot: Homer’s lawsuit money (which is won from Krusty, despite the incident not even having taken place at a Krusty Burger) is invested in an online poker account that comes into play later. But before there, there are two solidly memorable gags before the first commercial break: the cascade of thought bubbles as Homer decides to order something unhealthy is great, and Homer’s conversation in the bar in which he’s told that, regarding Sesame Street, "All the frogs in that show are Kermit." Read More...